PNG is drawing a line under a controversial decision to buy luxury cars for a leaders summit by selling them off to the highest bidders, but now it's a question of who in the country has that kind of money and wants to spend it on a vehicle for which mechanical backup will be hard to find.

China's air force issues a sobering message to Taiwan to ring in China's New Year, releasing a video of military jets flying around the self-ruled island — within hours Taiwan responded with a video of their own military capabilities.

Scientists making their first visit to a Tongan island that rose out of the sea after a volcanic eruption in 2015 find clues as to why it has lasted so long — and a bafflingly sticky, "light-coloured" mud.

The Kurdish-Iranian journalist's book No Friend But the Mountains: Writing from Manus Prison was written on his mobile phone over multiple years and he hopes the win will "bring more attention" to the situation of refugees in detention.

It is hard to think of a recent campaign where so many seats genuinely felt up for grabs by Labor, leaving Bill Shorten and Scott Morrison with their campaigning work cut out for them, writes Laura Tingle.

A former minister for the Pacific has broken ranks with the Morrison Government and publicly blasted the Prime Minister for saddling countries in the South Pacific with additional debt at a time when several are struggling to repay already massive loans.